“Ideal Diet”: Processed Foods In Restaurants And Supermarkets Are High In Sodium Which Leads To As Many As “150,000 Early Deaths” Annually According To The American Medical Association

EAT “NON-PROCESSED” FOODS…EAT HIGH QUALITY FOODS NATURALLY LOW IN CALORIES AND HIGH IN FIBER…MORE “REASONS” TO ACHIEVE IDEAL SHAPE….

Moreover, most of the salt we consume is not added in our home kitchens or at the table. Instead, it’s added by food processors to the food we buy in supermarkets and restaurants.

According to the American Medical Association, as many as 150,000 early deaths each year might be saved if Americans were to reduce their salt consumption by 50 percent. Because the sodium in salt raises blood pressure, which in turn increases the risk of heart attacks and strokes, less sodium means better health for many of us.

But merely telling people to eat less salt is unlikely to do the trick. After all, people like salt for its flavor. Moreover, most of the salt we consume is not added in our home kitchens or at the table. Instead, it’s added by food processors to the food we buy in supermarkets and restaurants.

We just don’t realize how much salt we’re eating in many products. Although packaged goods today contain standardized information about sodium, it’s easily ignored or misunderstood (cast as it is in terms of portion size and daily recommended amounts).

A more creative way to attack this problem is with performance-based regulation.

This approach imposes outcome targets on business by imposing financial penalties if those targets aren’t met.

The more nimble the business, the more likely it is to achieve the targets most efficiently.

For salt, we could demand that large retailers cut the total amount of salt in the food they sell. Regulated firms would include both retailers that sell primarily for home consumption – like Wal-Mart, Costco, Walgreens and supermarket chains – and those that sell prepared foods mostly to eat on site – like McDonald’s and Applebee’s.